From Wired - this blows me away.
When huge, nameless, faceless corporations try to impose "linking policies" upon webmasters who want to point to the company's site, people usually react in a predictable way. They get mad, they spitefully put up dozens of policy-violating links, and they bemoan, once more, the fact that some folks still don't understand that if you don't want to be linked you shouldn't be on the Web.
The reaction was much the same on Wednesday, when webloggers discovered that yet another huge organization is trying to lay down rigid linking guidelines -- only this time the huge organization is National Public Radio, the ad-free, member-supported radio network that often paints itself as the antithesis of all things big and corporate.
This is absurd. I would have thought that NPR, of all organizations would get that the web and linking is all about enabling the free flow of ideas and information to the people - which I thought was what NPR stood for. Instead, they're taking a real head-in-the-sand stance - they're afraid that some nasty commercial site or hate site will link to them. Well guess what - that's the way the web works and it's not a big deal.
So as an act of civil disobedience, I encourage everyone that has a web site to link to the NPR site without registering with NPR. I'm a HUGE fan and supporter of NPR, but this is really ridiculous.
9:21:38 AM 
|
